|
|
Post by luke on Feb 23, 2006 13:25:14 GMT -5
Yeah...some of those old PM covers are a real kick...
|
|
|
|
Post by Thorngrub on Feb 23, 2006 13:25:47 GMT -5
My favorite Asimov epithet was when he considered the most advanced portable, personal entertainment/educational device, which would exceed the capacity and efficiency of a personal cassette player for instance. He envisioned that it would feature a "power supply" that was veritably limitless; that it would be totally silent (so as not to disturb others in a public place, such as on a bus or park bench for instance), that it would feature the capability for the user to either "fast-forward" or "rewind" in an instant, and that would also meet the requirements of being necessarily compact enough to easily carry around.
Sound like an iPod w/infinite battery power?
He was referring to a book.
|
|
|
|
Post by luke on Feb 23, 2006 13:34:39 GMT -5
Yes...that's a lot like in "The Feeling of Power" from Nine Tomorrows, when scientists of the future (re)discover the ability to do math in their heads instead of on a computer, and consider this ability an incredible weapon of mass destruction...
|
|
|
|
Post by Thorngrub on Feb 23, 2006 13:39:00 GMT -5
Yes...that's a lot like in "The Feeling of Power" from Nine Tomorrows, when scientists of the future (re)discover the ability to do math in their heads instead of on a computer, and consider this ability an incredible weapon of mass destruction... heheh. . . . excellent . . . |
|
|
|
Post by bowiglou on Feb 23, 2006 17:13:36 GMT -5
HI all...first time on this board, but I adore reading so I'll share my current tomes:
(1) For the past 1.5 year been on a kick of catching up on the classics that I may possibly have read as a youngster (as required reading) or should have read.......to date have read: Hunchback of Notre Dame, Wuthering Heights, The Jungle, Lollita, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Red and Black, Of Human Bondage, and Moby Dick.........and currently reading Dickens' Oliver Twist.........another amazing (and very depressing) tome....
(2) God Created the Integers: The Mathematical Breakthroughs That Changed History (Hawkings)...very difficult book, written virtually in the original hand of the authors (e.g, Euclid, etc.)..can only read about 2 pages at a time
(3) No Blacks, Irish, etc...by Johnny Rotten.....fun read.....light and full of Rotten's irreverence
(4) The Remarkable Mathemeticians.......historical text of the famous in math (Laplace, etc.).......
(5) The Republican War on Science by Chris Mooney....great text though I've only started and somewhat deplorable what has happened to science via the politicos in power
(6) The Cosmic Landscape : String Theory and the Illusion of Intelligent Design by Leonard Susskind ..........not to everyone's taste I'm sure but this physicist makes a very complex subject rather tangible
......generally I read one novel/one science text/one rock and roll/one current events....
|
|
|
|
Post by poseidon on Feb 23, 2006 20:01:14 GMT -5
You have to remember Thorny I live in a small town... in Texas.  An ultra christian-conservative one at that! This town doesn't have a temple nor a synagogue... that in itself should tell you something!  |
|
|
|
Post by poseidon on Feb 23, 2006 20:14:35 GMT -5
HI all...first time on this board, but I adore reading so I'll share my current tomes: (1) For the past 1.5 year been on a kick of catching up on the classics that I may possibly have read as a youngster (as required reading) or should have read.......to date have read: Hunchback of Notre Dame, Wuthering Heights, The Jungle, Lollita, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Red and Black, Of Human Bondage, and Moby Dick.........and currently reading Dickens' Oliver Twist.........another amazing (and very depressing) tome.... (2) God Created the Integers: The Mathematical Breakthroughs That Changed History (Hawkings)...very difficult book, written virtually in the original hand of the authors (e.g, Euclid, etc.)..can only read about 2 pages at a time (3) No Blacks, Irish, etc...by Johnny Rotten.....fun read.....light and full of Rotten's irreverence (4) The Remarkable Mathemeticians.......historical text of the famous in math (Laplace, etc.)....... (5) The Republican War on Science by Chris Mooney....great text though I've only started and somewhat deplorable what has happened to science via the politicos in power (6) The Cosmic Landscape : String Theory and the Illusion of Intelligent Design by Leonard Susskind ..........not to everyone's taste I'm sure but this physicist makes a very complex subject rather tangible ......generally I read one novel/one science text/one rock and roll/one current events.... Read Moby Dick and Oliver Twist way back when. Enjoyed Twist immensely. Don't recall much about Dick other than it was...pardon the pun...long! |
|
|
|
Post by bowiglou on Feb 24, 2006 0:05:37 GMT -5
yeah Pat, Moby Dick is a bit lengthy, but a very good and gripping read...and thank god for the glossary at the end of the text, as the nautical vernacular was a foreign language to me!!...and Oliver Twist is fantastic but amazingly depressing......
pat, depressing just like Hunchback of Notre Dame.....Disney makes Hugo's classic into a feelgood flick, but the book is bleak and despairing.....through and through!!
|
|
|
|
Post by luke on Feb 24, 2006 8:05:26 GMT -5
Got White Hotel on Half.com for a $1.90...came in yesterday, about 60 pages in.
|
|
|
|
Post by phil on Feb 25, 2006 10:01:23 GMT -5
On those last days of the Turino's Olympics,
here are a few books/authors from Italy worth reading ...
No ! I'm not talking about Umberto Eco ...
As fine a writer as he is ...
- Conscience of Zeno (1923) by Italo Svevo
- The Dust Roads of Monferrato (1990) by Rosetta Loy
- Christ Stopped at Eboli (1945) by Carlo Levi
- If This Is A Man (1947) by Primo Levi
Surely one of the most harrowing book you can read
about the nazis' extermination camps ...
|
|
|
|
Post by phil on Feb 25, 2006 10:03:20 GMT -5
Consider whether this is a man,
Who labours in the mud
Who knows no peace
Who fights for a crust of bread
Who dies at a yes or a no.
Consider whether this is a woman,
Without hair or name
With no more strength to remember
Eyes empty and womb cold
As a frog in winter.
Primo Levi
(from 'Shemá' in Collected Poems)
|
|
|
|
Post by poseidon on Feb 25, 2006 14:52:08 GMT -5
Speaking of Levi's: I get these great buys at the Levi store at levistore.com. Buy two pairs of jeans and get a free sweater/shirt/accessory. (A bona-fide STEAL!) Your choice. I get my levi shirts there typically as Levi shirts (with insignia) are so difficult to find at your average Sears or J.C. Penney. Some great sales at times (my jeans are much less than typical dept. store prices!) Heres the link: www.levisstore.com/shop/index.jsp?categoryId=2068573 |
|
|
|
Post by poseidon on Feb 25, 2006 14:56:29 GMT -5
My motto: Live and die in 501's!
|
|
|
|
Post by phil on Mar 10, 2006 21:23:23 GMT -5
Seems like I'll have to find another place ...
Nevermind !
|
|
|
|
Post by rockkid on Mar 10, 2006 22:14:01 GMT -5
Finished Kings Cell @ one thirty in the morn the other night/day. Kept reading and reading because it was a slam bam book right form 3 or so pages in. Full of late night excitement I reach the gasping pathetic end. Disappointment plus (can you spell let down) Like a powerful car that blows its gaskets near the end o’ the quarter mile. The excerpt from his next tome (can’t remember the name) used as filler in the rear hasn’t inspired me to wait breathlessly for it either. Waste shameful waste, so good, to good to end the way it did. Excuse me while I spit out the bitter taste.  |
|
